I used to be pretty indifferent to Taylor Swift, like a lot of the world. But with the release of her newest album and the reinventing of herself as a badass feminist icon, I’m on board. You may scoff at the idea of me calling Taylor Swift a feminist, but I will scoff at you. You don’t even need to take a closer look to see how she’s owning feminism, it’s right in plain sight.

Swift’s friend Lena Dunham said it best: “She runs her own company, she’s creating music that connects to other women instead of creating a sexual persona for the male gaze and no one is in control of her. If that’s not feminism, what is?” Amen, Lena. Taylor Swift is feminist in the best way possible; Instead of pointing the finger left & right about what wrong things men & society are doing to women, she doles out unwavering support and an unbeatable wave of girl power. She posts picture after picture of her and her best friends being themselves, having fun, and most importantly, supporting each other in whatever it is they’re out to do. It brings the whole squad goals thing to another level, because every young girl out their should strive to be a part of a group, a community of women who supports them. Taylor Swift is showing us how. Hell, she just made an incredible video for “Bad Blood” with a badass gang of girls coming together to defeat a shared enemy.

Not to mention, her music is kicking butt. Not only does it sound fantastic, it connects to women in a way that a lot of other music doesn’t. She makes music for real women, not what people think women want to hear. She’s on a new level of #relatable. She lets out an inner dialogue that a lot of women can see within themselves, add some fucking fantastic pop music to that and it’s impossible not to adore it. In my eyes, it’s impossible not to adore Taylor Swift.

Honestly, Taylor has become the kind of role model I would want my future daughter to have. She values friendship above all else, as well as her fans. She makes her position of fame count, by standing up for things that might not get a chance to be heard otherwise. Like how she just totally whipped Apple into shape and held them accountable for not paying artists royalties during the free trial of their new streaming service. Which, a lot of people thought was her being greedy, but I believe she was just trying to stand up for the hundreds of smaller artists on the service not getting what they deserve. And also how she was voted hottest woman by Maxim magazine and used that as an opportunity to talk about misogyny, feminism, and the power of friends. You go, Taylor. You’re killing it.

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